Quotes of the Day
It is jarring to see Eric Tsang angry. The jovial actor, whose ubiquity in Hong Kong films—he's been in nearly 150—has made him a fixture on cable systems throughout Asia, is synonymous with lowbrow high jinks and slapstick physicality. Yet here he is, feet planted defiantly on a Kowloon street, ignoring an imprecating photographer who is losing a race with the setting sun to snap a natural-light portrait. Tsang's full-moon of a face, which is seen onscreen usually deployed in an overwrought double take or wide-eyed surprise, is now reddening as he barks in Cantonese into his cell phone. Even Tsang's assistant, shaking her head in fear, refuses to interrupt him. Finally, Tsang punches the end button and walks back across the street to where the photographer is waiting. As he strolls, his features melt back into the familiar, cheerful expression that any TV addict knows so well. By the time Tsang steps before the lens, it seems all the brightness a photographer might ever need is emanating from Tsang's signature toothy grin.
Tsang might channel Elmer Fudd onscreen, but in real life he's all business, and indeed has aspirations to become an entertainment mogul. "Every actor has to specialize to survive," Tsang, 50, says. "My specialty is looking like a cartoon character." Looney Tuning himself has paid off handsomely for the 1.6-meter-tall actor: over the past 30 years he has worked steadily and made a name for himself as one of the most reliable—and castable—actors in Asia. Lately, however, Tsang has won over critics as well as moviegoers with a more sinister turn as Sam, the triad boss in the hit trilogy Infernal Affairs. He relished suspending his animated persona. "I love this role," he grins. "I play the Mafia boss so everybody has to stand behind me."
This may be a case of what's up there on the screen finally catching up with reality. Tsang is no Mafia don, but after three decades in the movie industry as an actor, director, producer and scriptwriter, the Hong Kong native has left a permanent imprint on the territory's films. In addition to those movies in which he has been in front of the camera, Tsang has also been the brains or inspiration—either directly or indirectly—behind thousands more. Hit movies in which he did not appear, such as Aces Go Places and Jan Dara as well as the soon-to-be-released Golden Chicken II (CG2), may not have been made—or would have been very different—without him. "People always go to him for advice," says Peter Chan, producer of CG2 who also directed Tsang in the actor's two Hong Kong Film Awards-winning performances in Comrade: Almost a Love Story and Alan & Eric. "He is probably the most generous person ever in this business. He has helped groom and grow a whole bunch of talent, including myself."
Why, in an industry in which ideas matter most, is Tsang so forthcoming with his? During a filming break on the set of his latest movie, Tsang elaborates, "Perhaps it's because I really like helping people, so people like helping me in return." Help from famous friends can be quite rewarding, he adds. "Men Suddenly in Black is the first movie I've funded in over 10 years, so I asked a lot of my friends for help—and nearly 30 of them made cameo appearances." He admits to giving up as much as 97% of his normal fee to take on a project, such as a theater production in Guangzhou. "If it's a good script," he says, "I'll do it for no money." Indeed, despite his pecuniary and professional success, life for Tsang, who doesn't own a yacht or a Ferrari or a wardrobe full of Armani, is definitely not about the bling bling. "I'm already an actor, that's flashy enough," he explains. "I don't need to wear a lot of diamonds on my watch to tell other people I'm rich and successful. I think it's better if other people give you that feeling of success."
Indeed, Tsang has suffered more than his usually happy-go-lucky onscreen persona would suggest. He was the uncredited director for half of the infamous Jackie Chan fiasco Armour of God, and it was under his watch that Chan experienced his worst accident ever, which required brain surgery and a one-year hiatus. And Tsang's personal life hasn't exactly been a romantic comedy. His first marriage, in 1972, which produced two daughters—Wing-yee, now a housewife, and Bowie, today a popular TV personality in Taiwan—ended in divorce after four years. "I liked hanging out with my friends too much," Tsang says of those days. "I was never home." (He currently lives with his second wife and their two grown sons, one of whom, Derek, is also an actor.) But the worst came on July 7, 2001, when he was brutally attacked outside a bar in Kowloon and rushed to hospital with three gashes to his head that required 29 stitches. Although 13 men were arrested in connection with the beating, including the chairman of a Hong Kong-based entertainment group, they were all released and no charges were filed. Police still have no leads on the case, and neither does Tsang. Rumors have persisted that Tsang insulted the wrong sort of people. "I think that even if I pissed someone off, my words alone wouldn't have been such a big deal," he says. He views the assault as the cost of doing business in Hong Kong films. "No matter how you guard against it—if it's going to happen, it's going to happen," he says. "If you have three bodyguards, they'll have 10. You have guns, they'll have bombs."
Having already remade himself as a serious actor, Tsang is now planning his greatest makeover yet. "I want to be the next big boss of Hong Kong films," he says. "Then I could just call a distributor in Korea or Taiwan and say I have a new movie and they would take it without question." He has been founding production companies, such as Alan & Eric and UFO, since the late 1980s and most recently established an entertainment conglomerate called Star East Holdings Ltd., which last year produced the movies The Eye and Three as well as the TV drama The New Option. He spends much of his time in China, where he is trying to strengthen ties between the mainland's entertainment industry and Hong Kong's. He's even begun building a performing-arts university in Beijing, in part to scout out young talent.
On most of his movie sets, however, Tsang is already the headman. During filming for Crazy Girls Infernal Affairs, a parody of the hit trilogy, Tsang stands in front of a Buddhist temple, shouting out an elaborate initiation ritual to a line of young extras. After the first take, he orders the extras to remove their shirts, telling them to flex their fake tattoos for the camera. The movie's director, Jing Wong (God of Gamblers, Royal Tramp), doesn't seem to mind Tsang taking control—in fact, it's part of the reason Wong cast him. "Eric's very creative and can contribute a lot to dialogue, costumes, the acting, and the comic setups," he says as Tsang barks more instructions to the younger actors and repositions them in front of the camera. Eric Tsang, Hong Kong's Everyman, might already be on his way to becoming the industry's boss man.
- Kate Drake | Hong Kong
- Eric Tsang, one of the stars of the new Infernal Affairs III, wants to be the kingpin of Hong Kong cinema